Two men worked together — one cutting the snow blocks, the other putting them together. Blocks of snow were cut from snowbanks with bone or ivory knives that had a slight curve to the blade. Following the introduction of metal to the Arctic, the Inuit made snow knives with single-edged steel blades.

The preferred snow for the construction of a snowhouse was from a bank formed by a single snowstorm. Blocks taken from snowbanks formed over a series of storms tended to break easily.

The first row of blocks is laid out in a circle and then slanted to form a spiral line. The beginning of the second row butts up to the last block of the first row and each block is given a slight incline toward the inside of the house.

As the blocks are placed around the spiral, they are given greater angles, thus creating the dome. Snowhouses built for long term habitation were approximately 3.7 m (12 feet) high and 4.5 m (15 feet) in diameter.